Daily Archives: September 5, 2018

Let’s be honest : DC has attempted something like a half-dozen or so re-launches of their once-venerable Vertigo line over the last decade-plus, and they’ve all run out of gas — usually sooner rather than later. Something about their latest attempt at a “do-over,” though, feels a little bit different.

Maybe it’s because they’ve re-named the imprint “DC Vertigo.” Maybe it’s because it coincides with the label’s 25th anniversary. Maybe it’s because it’s anchored by a slew of Sandman spin-off titles boasting at least a modicum of involvement from Neil Gaiman himself. Or maybe it’s because the new creator-owned books they’re launching more-or-less in conjunction with The Sandman Universe appear to have a unifying ethos of some sort behind them (politically aware, by authors either entirely or relatively new to the comics medium, many hailing from creative backgrounds bordering on the exotic), as well as some actual promotional muscle.

Granted, we’re skirting the definition of “Eurocomics” a bit with this one given that Max de Rodigues’ Bastard was originally serialized in mini-comics form by an American publisher (specifically Chuck Forsman’s Oily Comics), but de Rodigues hails from Belgium and brings a decided “outsider’s perspective” to a couple of classic slices of Americana, namely the sprawling landscape of the Southwest and the venerable “criminals on the run” take on the larger “road movie” genre, so forgive me stretching the category out a bit to —“but wait!,” I hear you say, “This isn’t a movie!”

Says you. And while you’re absolutely right on a purely technical level, in point of fact, this new graphic novel collection of de Rodigues’ complete story from Fantagraphics (several pages of which appear to have been either completely re-drawn, or substantially “tightened up” with new, thicker, more fluid inks) plays out with all the pacing…

It’s the date for the latest entry to the Halloween franchise. It’s to be a sequel to the original film. It will also discard every other Halloween sequel ever made. So, for those who are so anti-remake/reboot this should alleviate any of those triggers.

David Gordon Green (who co-wrote this sequel with Danny McBride and Jeff Fradley) directs this sequel as a continuation of the events which happened with the original film. A follow-up that’s 40 years in the making, literally.

So, once again, remember October 19th and make sure to check this film out. I have a sneaking suspicion that it’ll be the true sequel to Carpenter’s classic.

In 1982, ABC News produced a documentary called Vietnam Requiem. Directed by Bill Couturié and Jonas McCord, Vietnam Requiem deal with the post-traumatic stress disorder that was suffered by many veterans of the Vietnam War. During the documentary, it was stated that the average of the soldier in Vietnam was 19.

Among those who watched the documentary when it finally aired in 1984 was musician Paul Hardcastle. Struck by the contrast between his life at 19 with the lives of the soldiers in Vietnam, Harcastle created a song called 19, which heavily sampled Vietnam Requiem‘s narration, which was provided by veteran announced Peter Thomas.

The song became an unexpected hit in both the UK and the US. In fact, it was so unexpected that no one had even planned to produce a video for it. When 19 reached the top of the UK Singles charts, McCord and Couturié were asked to quickly assemble a video for it.

The majority of the video is made up of clips from Vietnam Requiem. The journalist who is seen reporting on the war is Frank Reynolds, who was the notoriously prickly anchor of ABC News from 1978 until 1983. (Reynolds is best known for shouting, “Let’s get it nailed down … somebody … let’s find out! Let’s get it straight so we can report this thing accurately!” during coverage of the attempted assassination of then-President Ronald Reagan. All in all, that’s not a bad thing for a journalist to yell.) ABC news later objected to the use of their footage in the video, claiming that being associated with MTV would “trivialize” the news. A second version of the video was produced, using public domain stock footage but ABC did allow Reynolds’s voice to continue to be heard in the song.

Now considered to be a classic one-hit wonder, 19 briefly entered the UK charts again, in 2011, when Manchester United used the song to celebrate their 19th Premier League title.